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Twelve Hours of Temptation
Shoma Narayanan


The best mistake of his life?Copywriter Melissa should be at an awards ceremony – but she’s stuck in the office! So she can’t refuse when her gorgeous boss Samir offers to drive her himself.On the road, Samir knows he’s in trouble! Being this close to Melissa is driving him crazy – and they’ve got twelve torturous hours of temptation ahead…!









Her insides were doing weird things at his touch, and the temptation to touch him in return was immense.


She tried to kill the fantasy by imagining his reaction. Shock? Embarrassment? Then she remembered the feel of his lips on her fingers as he’d taken the sticky candy from them, and she couldn’t help thinking that maybe, just maybe, he’d reciprocate. Bend down and kiss her. Tangle his big strong hands in her hair and tip her head back to get better access to her lips …

‘Melissa?’

Brought back to earth with a thump, she realised he was holding the car door open for her.

‘Sorry,’ she said, sliding into her seat quickly.

‘You’re a complete daydreamer, aren’t you?’ he asked, looking rather amused as he got into the driver’s seat. ‘What were you thinking about?’

Ha—wouldn’t you like to know? Melissa felt like saying. ‘Just stuff,’ she said after a pause.

‘Random stuff?’

‘Oh, very random.’

His lips quirked up at the corners as if he was trying hard not to smile.

Melissa had a nasty feeling that he knew exactly what she’d been thinking about.


Dear Reader

This is my fifth book for Harlequin Mills and Boon


, and I came up with the plot during a road trip from Mumbai to Goa. I scribbled out the outline while my husband drove and my kids dozed in the back seat. Then, three months later, with a deadline looming up ahead, I tried to make sense of the squiggles on the page. My laptop obligingly crashed when I was halfway through writing, and I finished the book on the trusty old laptop that I wrote my first book on. Zero battery life and clunky keyboard vs sleek lavender keys and flashing hieroglyphs where my manuscript used to be—well, the clunky laptop wins every time.

Melissa and Samir, the two lead characters in this book, are very different from each other. Melissa is pretty in an understated, elfin kind of way, and she has a wicked sense of humour. People often write her off as a quiet, rather mousy girl—it’s only when they get talking to her that they wonder why they’ve never noticed the mischief in her eyes, and her melting smile.

Samir, on the other hand, is strikingly good-looking, very successful, and perhaps just a little arrogant. He’s used to women chasing after him, and he’s had his share of relationships—still, he gives the impression of being cold and aloof. He’s instantly attracted to Melissa when he meets her, but he holds back so that she ends up making the first move. Both of them are carrying baggage from previous relationships, and it takes them a while for them to recognise that it’s more than sheer physical attraction holding them together.

I’ve set the book in two of my favourite places—Mumbai and Goa—and I hope I’ve managed to capture the essence of both. Now all I need to do is explain to my indignant kids why this book is dedicated ‘just to Papa’ …

Happy reading!

Shoma


Twelve Hours

of Temptation

Shoma Narayanan






www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


SHOMA NARAYANAN started reading Mills and Boon® romances at the age of eleven, borrowing them from neighbours and hiding them inside textbooks so that her parents didn’t find out. At that time the thought of writing one herself never entered her head—she was convinced she wanted to be a teacher when she grew up. When she was a little older she decided to become an engineer instead, and took a degree in electronics and telecommunications. Then she thought a career in management was probably a better bet, and went off to do an MBA. That was a decision she never regretted, because she met the man of her dreams in the first year of business school—fifteen years later they’re married with two adorable kids, whom they’re raising with the same careful attention to detail that they gave their second-year project on organisational behaviour.

A couple of years ago Shoma took up writing as a hobby—after successively trying her hand at baking, sewing, knitting, crochet and patchwork—and was amazed at how much she enjoyed it. Now she works grimly at her banking job through the week, and tries to balance writing with household chores during weekends. Her family has been unfailingly supportive of her latest hobby, and are also secretly very, very relieved that they don’t have to eat, wear or display the results!



Other Modern Tempted™ titles by Shoma Narayanan:

THE ONE SHE WAS WARNED ABOUT

This and other titles by Shoma Narayanan are available in eBook format from www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


To Badri


Contents

Chapter One (#ua7a26834-9a4a-53d5-82fc-c8da16b0884f)

Chapter Two (#uc8c19599-31f0-5866-9318-fcf59bef2376)

Chapter Three (#u9eb16af3-719a-50f6-be3c-fb3e45f95c3e)

Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)

Extract (#litres_trial_promo)


ONE

‘Brian’s selling the agency.’

The words didn’t sink in at first because Melissa was busy squinting at her keyboard. Damn the O key. It was jamming up again. The last line she’d typed read as if it had a particularly nasty swear word in it—the difference a single missing o could make was amazing.

‘I need a new keyboard,’ she said. ‘Unless... What did you say?’

Pleased at the impact she’d created, Neera plopped her lush backside onto Melissa’s desk and beamed at her pretty young friend. ‘It’s true. He’s going to announce it today.’

Melissa stared at her in dismay. Brian Mendonca had set up the tiny advertising agency thirty years ago, and it was more like an extended family than a workplace. Melissa herself had been working there for a little over two years, and she loved the place.

‘Who’s buying it?’

‘Maximus Advertising. They’re expanding...and Brian wants to retire and go back to Goa, apparently.’ Neera looked over her shoulder and then leaned down. ‘Don’t look now, but the guy who’s taking over is with Brian right now. He’s pretty hot, actually, can’t be very old...’

As Melissa instinctively turned, Neera tugged her back, and all she caught a glimpse of was a tall man walking out of the main entrance of the office with Brian.

* * *

‘His name’s Samir Razdan,’ Neera reported two days later.

Melissa abandoned the ad she was working on to search the internet for the name.

‘Impressive,’ she said. ‘Studied in the US. He’s been working for only ten years and he’s already Maximus’s corporate strategy head. Looks pretty arrogant, though—like he thinks he’s a lot smarter than anyone else.’

The picture on the Maximus website showed a strong-featured man in his early thirties—even the grim expression in his eyes didn’t detract from his good looks.

‘Shh...’ Neera muttered, and Melissa turned to see Brian bearing down on them with the subject of the photograph in tow.

The man was magnificent in real life. There was no other word for it, Melissa thought as she stared at him. Well over six feet in height, he towered over Brian—and the contrast between Brian’s rather pudgy middle-aged form and Samir Razdan’s perfectly proportioned physique was striking.

She hadn’t had enough time to switch screens, and her browser still had the Maximus website open. Melissa wondered if he’d overheard her remark.

‘Meet some of the most talented people on the team,’ Brian said, beaming at both of them. ‘Neera is our creative head, and Melissa’s our star copywriter.’

‘It’s so nice to meet you,’ Neera gushed, holding out her hand.

Samir took it after a second’s hesitation and said, ‘It’s a pleasure.’

His tone was formal, almost dismissive, and Melissa immediately felt her hackles rise. Neera could come across as a bit silly at times, but she was brilliant at her work and Samir had absolutely no business looking down at her.

‘And this is Melissa,’ Brian said fondly, and his expression suggested an indulgent grandfather introducing a favourite but slightly unpredictable grandchild.

‘Hi,’ Melissa said coolly, giving Samir a slow once-over. She didn’t stand up—even in her two-inch heels she would probably only reach his chin. And Brian hadn’t said that Samir was taking over the company—there was no need for her to spring to attention.

As her eyes drifted over his body she couldn’t help noticing how broad his shoulders were, and how perfectly his formal blue shirt and grey trousers fitted his athletic frame.... For a few seconds she actually felt her breathing get a bit out of control. Then she gave herself a mental slap. Getting distracted was not supposed to happen. The ‘once-over technique’ was something her sister-in-law had taught her. Used to ogling women themselves, most men were made profoundly uncomfortable by an attractive woman looking them over as if she found something lacking.

Okay, so that was most men. When her eyes met Samir’s again he didn’t look the least bit fazed—if anything, there was the merest hint of a twinkle in his eyes.

‘Your star copywriter, you say?’ he said to Brian.

‘Yes, one of her ads has been nominated for an award this year,’ Brian said. Clearly eager to undo the damage his protégée was hell-bent on doing, he went on, ‘I’m expecting it to win silver at the very least—if not gold.’

‘Impressive,’ Samir said, and Melissa had no way of knowing if he was being sarcastic or not. ‘Well, I’ll see you ladies around.’

His eyes flickered for a second towards Melissa’s computer screen. The Maximus website was still open, with Samir Razdan’s picture occupying pride of place at the top right-hand corner. The man himself didn’t react, however, giving the girls a polite nod and continuing towards the exit.

‘He seems pretty nice,’ Neera said as the doors closed behind him.

Melissa stared at her in disbelief. ‘You can’t be serious!’ she said, turning to the elderly Hindi copywriter who sat next to her. ‘You saw him, Dubeyji, what did you think?’

‘He’s a good businessman,’ Dubeyji said a little sadly. ‘Doesn’t let people know what he’s thinking. But I’m sure he’ll get rid of the old fogeys like me. I know how Maximus runs—it’s like a factory. We’ll just be a little insignificant part of their operations. They wouldn’t even have looked at us if it wasn’t for the awards we’ve got recently.’

‘He’s right,’ Melissa burst out, getting to her feet in agitation. ‘It’s not about this Razdan guy. Maximus will probably sack half of us, and the rest will have to go work in one of those hideous blue glass buildings and wear access cards and queue up for lunch at the cafeteria...’

‘And hopefully we’ll get paid every month,’ said Devdeep, the agency’s client servicing head, as he strolled up. ‘Melissa, we all love Brian, but creative freedom is a bit of a luxury when we’re losing clients every day.’

‘He’s great at what he does,’ Melissa said hotly. ‘None of us have one tenth of his talent and—’

‘I agree,’ Devdeep said. ‘The point is the world’s moved a little beyond print advertising. I know TV might be a bit much for an agency this size to handle, though we could have done it if we’d expanded at the right time. But there’s digital advertising and social media—let’s admit it: we’ve lost some of our best clients because Brian doesn’t hold with “all that new technology rubbish”.’

‘He’s right,’ Neera said. ‘Melly, if Brian continues to run this place we’ll all be out of jobs within a year. Awards or no awards. He’s a bit of a...well, not a dinosaur, exactly, but definitely ancient.’

‘A mastodon, maybe,’ Devdeep said, giving Melissa an irritatingly superior smile. ‘Or a woolly mammoth.’

‘Remind me not to ask you guys to bat for me ever,’ Melissa muttered, and turned back to her computer to pound savagely at the keys.

She was unswervingly loyal to Brian, and she didn’t understand how everyone else wasn’t the same. Brian had done so much for each of them—Melissa knew that he’d given Devdeep a job when he’d been sacked from another agency, and that he’d advanced Neera a pot of money to pay for her mum’s bypass surgery a year ago. Their criticising him was a bit like a bunch of Kolkata street kids saying that the Sisters of Charity could do with a make-over and a new uniform.

* * *

‘I thought you hadn’t yet told your staff about the buy-out?’ said Samir.

‘I haven’t,’ Brian replied. ‘But it’s a small office—the finance guys guessed something was happening and the word must have spread.’

‘Evidently,’ Samir agreed, his voice dry. ‘I’d suggest you talk to them. Those women were looking a bit jittery.’

Or at least one woman had been—the other had been anything but. For a few seconds his mind dwelled on the coolly challenging way in which she’d spoken to him. She’d known who he was, and it hadn’t fazed her in the least.

As it turned out Brian didn’t have to speak to the team as Devdeep had called everyone into a room and was in the process of giving them a pep talk. Brian didn’t object—he was already looking forward to a life of retirement, and anyway, Devdeep would be managing the bulk of the agency work until the sale went through.

Samir Razdan was a corporate restructuring expert, not an adman—there was even a chance Devdeep would get to head the agency once Samir got it fully integrated into the Maximus empire.

‘It’s all very well for you,’ Melissa told Brian crossly as he dropped her at her hostel in Colaba that evening. ‘You and Aunty Liz will have the time of your lives, going off on cruises and world tours, while all of us slog away for Robot Samir.’

Brian gave her a quizzical look. ‘You met him for all of five minutes,’ he pointed out. ‘Surely that’s not long enough to start calling him names?’

‘I looked him up before that,’ she said. ‘He’s a businessman through and through. I don’t think he has a creative bone in his body. He won’t do the agency any good, Brian, he’ll only try and squeeze out the last possible rupee of revenue he can. And you can tell a lot in five minutes—he’s pretty cold-blooded, and he obviously thinks he’s God’s gift to womankind.’

‘Ah...’ Brian said. ‘So that’s it. Paid more attention to Neera, did he?’

Brian was in his mid-fifties, and he still admired the fair-skinned, luscious beauties of his youth—Neera was a pretty fine example of the type.

‘No,’ Melissa said, exasperated. Apart from trivialising her concerns about the takeover, it wasn’t even true. Samir had hardly noticed Neera, and while he might not have been bowled over by Melissa she’d at least caught his attention.

Unbidden, her thoughts drifted back to the second their eyes had met...then she shook herself angrily. Brian’s habit of reducing everything to a simple man-woman equation was as annoying as it was infectious.

‘Look, I’m sorry I took off at you,’ she said. ‘It’s just that you and Aunty Liz have been like family to me, and I don’t know... I’m just a bit...’

The car had stopped outside the working women’s hostel where Melissa lived, and Brian reached out to give her a clumsy pat on the shoulder.

‘Sorry,’ Melissa said again, taking in his anxious expression. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not about to start howling. Just...stay in touch, OK? Even when you’re off living the high life,’ she added as she climbed out of the car, smiling at him before she closed the door.

‘Yes, of course.’

Overall, Brian looked rather relieved to be rid of her, and she couldn’t blame him. Emotional scenes weren’t really his thing.

‘I’ll ask Liz to call you. Fix dinner with us this Sunday, maybe, and we can talk things over.’

He was about to drive off when something struck him and he rolled the window down. ‘Don’t judge Samir too hastily, OK? He’s a great guy—just a little reserved. Wait till you get to know him better.’

Melissa waited while he drove off and then walked into the hostel, uncharacteristic tears pricking at her eyelids. She was distantly related to Brian’s wife, and two years ago, when her family had turned against her, Liz and Brian had brought her to Mumbai, given her a job and helped her settle down. Brian insisted that she’d more than repaid the debt with the amount of hard work she’d put in since joining the agency, but she felt more grateful and connected to the couple than she had to anyone else in her life. Brian’s announcement had come as a shock—it felt as if her last source of emotional support was now gone.

* * *

Three weeks later, when Samir moved into the Mendonca Advertising corner office, he found himself automatically looking for the dusky elfin woman he’d met the first day he’d visited the office. Brian had spoken to him about her later, and he was intrigued by the few things that Brian had let drop. He didn’t see her for the first week, though, and it was only at the beginning of the next week that he thought to ask someone where she was.

‘Is everyone in the office, Devdeep?’ he asked.

Devdeep wrinkled his forehead. ‘Yes, I think so,’ he said. ‘Was there someone you’d like to meet in particular? Because I’ve already lined up discussions with the team heads, but I can rejig them if needed.’

Distracted for a second by a vivid mental image of jigging team heads, Samir shook his head. ‘No. There were a couple of women Brian introduced me to the first day I was here. I can’t see either of them around.’

‘Ah, Neera and Melissa,’ Devdeep said. ‘Neera’s not well, but Melissa should be around—actually, she should be here already. I’ll speak to her about it. She’s normally never late.’

Samir heroically resisted the impulse to tell Devdeep not to get his panties in a twist and said instead, ‘Don’t worry about it. I was just wondering if she was on leave today.’

Ten minutes later he was left in no doubt as a pink-cheeked Melissa bounced into his office.

‘Devdeep said you were looking for me,’ she said. She’d already had a bit of a spat with Devdeep, and she was all set to do battle. ‘I got little delayed because there wasn’t a single cab on the roads today. There’s some kind of a strike. I’d have called and told someone if I’d known you needed to talk to me.’ She came to an abrupt halt, realising that it sounded as if she was making excuses. Damn, she’d wanted to come across as being completely cool and in charge of the situation.

Samir waited patiently till she was done. ‘I asked where you were because I was looking around for familiar faces,’ he said. ‘I didn’t see you all of last week.’

She was even prettier than he’d remembered—large, expressive chocolate-brown eyes in a piquant little face framed by masses of spun-silk hair. Right now, she looked defensive, and a lot less fiery than when he’d first met her, and he smiled at her reassuringly. The last thing he wanted was to terrorise the junior members of what he suspected was already a very apprehensive team.

Unfortunately Samir’s reassuring smile had the effect of making Melissa’s knees go just a little wobbly, and she took a few seconds to regroup before she said, ‘I was in a creative writing workshop last week. Brian suggested it, actually—he felt that it’d help with my work.’

‘That’s OK,’ Samir said, but Melissa still hesitated.

‘I paid for it myself,’ she volunteered.

At that, Samir looked up. ‘I think it would have made more sense for the agency to pay if Brian asked you to take the workshop,’ he said crisply. ‘I’ll speak to someone about it. And at some point I’d like you to take me through what you do—I’ll drop you a line and schedule a time. Is there something else you’d like to talk about now?’

Melissa’s slightly belligerent expression had vanished, but she still looked as if she wanted to get something off her chest.

‘Um, he mightn’t have told you, but it’s Devdeep’s birthday today,’ she said. ‘Brian’s secretary normally orders a cake, but this time she wasn’t sure what to do, so...’

‘She can order a cake,’ Samir said. ‘You know what? It’d help if you could spread the word—for now everything continues as usual. I’ll be making changes, but they’ll take time, and they’ll definitely not be about things like birthday cakes and what time people land up in office.’

Melissa’s eyes narrowed, but she didn’t say anything, whisking herself out of his office instead. In spite of his brusqueness there was a magnetic pull about Samir that was difficult to ignore. OK, magnetic pull was a really cheesy way of putting it, but that was how it felt. He was dressed casually, probably with the intention of blending in with the agency staff—but even in a linen shirt and faded jeans he exuded an aura of sheer masculine power that was difficult to ignore.

‘He said you should order the cake, Kash,’ she told Samir’s secretary on her way back to her desk. ‘Tell me when it’s here and we’ll set up the pantry for a party.’

Devdeep was dreadfully embarrassed by the fuss.

‘He’ll think we’re completely flaky,’ he protested, when Melissa and Kash told him.

‘Nonsense, even the president celebrates her birthday,’ Melissa said briskly. ‘Samir won’t think you’re flaky at all, and if he does we’ll put cockroaches in his room and spit in his water jug.’

‘Thanks for warning me,’ a dry voice said behind her, and Melissa jumped.

There he was, standing right behind her—all six foot two inches of scorching hot masculinity—and for the first time in her life Melissa found herself completely tongue-tied.

Devdeep turned a bright purple and said, ‘She was just joking, sir, of course we’d do nothing of the sort.’

‘Joking, was she?’ Samir gave her a long look that didn’t betray an iota of what he was thinking. ‘Many happy returns of the day, Devdeep. And you can call me Samir. I haven’t been knighted yet—and “sir” is a bit over the top, don’t you think?’

Devdeep was still in the midst of a rather incoherent reply when Samir interrupted.

‘Can I speak to you for a bit, Melissa?’

‘If you were trying to put him at ease it didn’t work,’ Melissa muttered once they were out of earshot. ‘Soon he’ll be thanking you for allowing him to breathe the same air as you.’

At that Samir finally laughed. ‘I can see I’ve been set up as a bit of an ogre, haven’t I?’

Melissa looked him squarely in the eyes. ‘No, you haven’t,’ she said. ‘Brian decided to sell you the agency, and we trust his judgement. But you sitting in your room and poring over financial statements day after day isn’t making people feel very confident.’

‘Right,’ Samir said. ‘I guess I should have explained that I’m only handling the take-over—I’ll have someone else actually managing the agency once I’ve got it fully integrated into Maximus. Look, Brian told me I could trust you to call things as they are. And that you’d be discreet even though you’re one of the younger members of the team.’

Melissa nodded in what she hoped was a suitably responsible and discreet manner. So far in every interaction with Samir she’d come across as being a lot more immature and irresponsible than she actually was, and she was keen to correct the impression before he wrote her off as a complete airhead. Staying calm and focussed was difficult, though, with the completely unexpected effect that he was having on her.

‘So it’d help if you told me exactly what people are worried about,’ he said, leading the way into his room. ‘I plan to address the team tomorrow, but I want to get my bearings first.’

‘The older guys think you’ll sack them,’ she said bluntly. ‘Especially the copywriters who work on regional languages. And people like me are worried that we’ll no longer be doing the kind of work Brian trained us for—we’ll just be churning out run-of-the-mill advertising. And a few, like Devdeep, just want to know how they can impress you and get promoted as soon as possible.’

Samir raised an eyebrow, and she went on.

‘I’m not criticising him. He’s probably the most sensible of the lot, and he has a wife and two kids to think of. It’s just that for the rest of us there was a reason we joined Mendonca’s, and the reason’s now gone.’

‘The work you’re talking about,’ Samir said. ‘Could I see some of the things the agency’s done in the past?’

‘It’s all around you!’ Melissa exclaimed, but then the bare walls of the room registered. ‘It’s been taken down,’ she said in surprise. ‘Brian had all our best work framed and put up on the walls. And there were the awards and certificates we won...’

She sounded distinctly upset now, and Samir found himself explaining.

‘I can’t work in clutter,’ he said. ‘I didn’t really look at the walls last time I was here, but I asked for the office to be cleared out completely before I joined. I assume Brian took the ads home.’

He was probably right—Brian had been inordinately proud of the collection of award-winning ads his walls had been plastered with and it was more than likely he hadn’t wanted to leave them behind. It felt a little as if the soul of the agency had been torn away, Melissa thought, and then gave herself a quick mental shake. Brian was gone, and agonising over the past wasn’t going to do her any good.

‘There are soft copies of everything saved on the common drive that we all have access to,’ she said briskly. ‘I can show you if you like.’

She went around to his side of the table so that she could show him where the ads were stored. As he turned the laptop, his hand touched hers briefly, and she pulled away as if from an electric shock. His lips tightened imperceptibly, making her flush. For a few seconds she’d forgotten that she was dealing with a rather dangerously good-looking man, and the sudden jolt of attraction had made her react stupidly.

‘So, the ads are here,’ she muttered, pointing at the screen. ‘I’ll...um...leave you to it, then.’

He looked up. ‘Which one is the ad you wrote—the one Brian said was nominated for an award?’

‘It’s in the Robinson folder,’ she said. ‘The third one.’

He pulled the ad up onto the screen and looked at it silently for a while. It was a text-only ad for a range of baby products, and she’d written it from the point of view of a first-time mum. It was charming, and a little whimsical, and it wasn’t really an ad in the traditional sense because it didn’t talk about the products at all—it just said ‘Happy Mother’s Day’ and the brand name at the end.

‘Interesting,’ Samir said. ‘Any idea on how it impacted sales?’

Melissa stared at him as if he’d suddenly grown a second head. ‘It doesn’t work that way,’ she protested. ‘Ads like these make customers connect with the brand. There’s no immediate effect on sales.’

‘Right...’ he said, but he was evidently not convinced. ‘Always helps to have sales figures, though.’

It took all Melissa’s willpower not to snap at him. ‘I work on the creative side,’ she said finally. ‘It’s the client servicing guys who work on the numbers.’

‘You’re not curious enough to ask for them?’

‘I did ask!’ she said. ‘The sales figures were good, but I’ve forgotten exactly what percent they went up by. Devdeep would have the details.’

Samir didn’t react, and she wondered if he’d even heard what she’d said. He was gazing intently at a spreadsheet now, his brows narrowed in concentration. In spite of her annoyance, one part of Melissa’s brain noted that he managed to look very, very hot in an intense, brooding kind of way. Even when he clearly found his spreadsheet more fascinating than her ad.

She moved towards the door in what she hoped was an unobtrusive manner, and her hand was on the doorknob when he looked up, his rather stern features lightened by a genuine smile.

‘It’s a great ad, by the way,’ he said. ‘I can see why Brian thought so highly of you.’

The smile made his eyes crinkle up at the corners—suddenly he seemed a lot more human and approachable, like a movie star morphing into the local college football hero. Except that he was far more potently male than the average college heartthrob, and Melissa felt her breath come a little faster.

‘Thank you,’ she said, all her usual poise deserting her. ‘I’ll...um...I’ll see you around, then, OK?’

She slipped out of the door, but it was a few minutes before Samir went back to his spreadsheet.


TWO

‘Where is everyone?’

Melissa looked up. ‘Devdeep and Shivani are in Goa for the ad awards,’ she said. ‘The rest of us are all here. As in they’re around,’ she added as Samir surveyed the empty cubicles and raised an eyebrow. ‘They’ve gone for breakfast, I think.’

Samir had been travelling, and it was a week since she’d last seen him. He looked tanned and fit and almost good enough to eat.

His brow creased in a frown. ‘If you wrote the ad why aren’t you on your way to Goa? Didn’t Devdeep think of taking you along?’

‘He did.’ Melissa bit her lip. She didn’t like Devdeep much, but the poor man wasn’t to blame for this particular situation.

‘And you decided not to go?’ Samir sounded positively incredulous now.

There was no way out of this other than admitting the embarrassing truth. ‘I...um...I have a slight phobia about flying,’ Melissa said in a rush. ‘The trains were booked solid because it’s a long weekend, and Devdeep said that going alone on a bus might not be safe.’

‘And a bullock cart would take too much time, I assume?’ Samir said, his lips twitching. ‘How about cycling to Goa? Did you consider that?’

‘Very funny,’ Melissa said crossly. ‘I did want to go. I’m just trying to tell you that it didn’t work out.’

Too late, she realised that snapping at the new agency head was probably not very bright of her. Luckily, he looked more amused than offended.

‘You could come with me,’ Samir said, taking even himself by surprise. ‘I’m driving down—I’m leaving early tomorrow morning and I can pick you up. Where d’you live?’

‘Colaba,’ Melissa said, trying not to gape at him. ‘But are you sure?’

‘Yes, I am,’ Samir said, though he was wondering whether he’d suddenly gone quite mad.

There was no way Melissa could know it, but he never volunteered to spend time with a woman—let alone thirteen hours closeted with one in a car. For a second he wondered whether he should retract the offer, but there was no way he could back out of it without coming across as being incredibly rude.

Oh, really, Razdan? he said wryly to himself as he took down her address and mobile number. As if the fear of being thought rude had ever stopped him in the past.

* * *

Melissa was ready on the dot of six, perched on her bed. It had taken some time to decide what to wear—too dressed up and he might think she was making a play for him—too casual and he mightn’t want to be seen with her. She’d finally settled for denim cut-offs with a long-sleeved white cotton shirt and sat down to wait.

Her phone rang at a quarter past six, and she picked it up, her heart suddenly beating a lot faster.

‘Hi,’ she said tentatively.

‘Ready to leave?’ he asked, not bothering to return her greeting. ‘I’m in a black car, right outside your hostel gate.’

And what a car it was. Melissa found it difficult to take her eyes off the sleek, powerfully built machine. Then she saw Samir, and her mouth went dry with longing. So far she’d only seen him in office clothes—in an open-necked T-shirt and cargo shorts he looked even hotter than he did in formals.

She took a deep breath before she crossed the road to join him. Letting him know how much he affected her was a bad, bad idea.

‘Thanks for doing this,’ she said politely as she got into the car. ‘I’m really looking forward to the awards festival, even if we don’t win anything.’

‘You’re welcome,’ Samir said.

She looked very young and appealing, with a little rucksack slung over one shoulder, and her hair held back with an Alice band, but there was something innocently sensual in the way she twisted her slim body around to toss the rucksack into the backseat. Her hair fell over her shoulder, and he caught a whiff of a fresh floral scent that made him want to reach out and touch—it took a strong effort of will to remain unaffected by her nearness.

‘Car rules,’ he said, passing her a bottle of water and hoping she hadn’t noticed him looking at her. ‘Seat belt on at all times. No eating in the car. And absolutely no attempts to change the music.’

Melissa peeked at his face to see if he was joking. Apparently not. With uncharacteristic meekness she tugged at the seat belt—the seat belt, however, seemed to have firm ideas of its own, and refused to budge.

‘I can’t—’ she started to say, and with an impatient shrug he leaned across to help her.

Melissa immediately froze. Her first thought was that he was much...much larger than she’d thought he was—the second was that if she moved just an inch she’d be touching him, and there was something terribly tempting about the thought. Then there was the smell of his aftershave... Woody, with a slight hint of citrus, it teased at her nostrils as he released the seat belt from where it was snagged behind her seat.

‘Here—it’s free now,’ he said.

He moved away from her, apparently completely unaffected by her proximity. Oh, well, maybe her three-hundred-rupee perfume and demure clothes just didn’t do it for him. Despite herself, she felt a little miffed. Sure, he was a hotshot executive and all that, but she would have liked him to take just a little interest in her as a woman. And her own reaction to him was annoying—she wasn’t usually the swooning-over-a-hot-man type. Then common sense reasserted itself. Samir was undeniably gorgeous, and there was absolutely nothing to be ashamed of in finding him lust-worthy. As long as she restricted herself to a purely aesthetic appreciation of his hotness she’d be fine.

Samir put the car into gear, his lips thinning. The tiny gasp that Melissa had let out when he’d leaned over her hadn’t escaped him, and he was regretting his offer of a lift more than ever.

Melissa was wrong about his reactions—one look at her long, tanned brown legs and her slim but curvy figure and everything male in him had responded enthusiastically. Being older and more experienced, he was just a great deal better at concealing his reactions.

They were both silent as the car sped through nearly empty streets all the way past Dadar and Chembur, and over the creek at Vashi. The sky was beginning to lighten, and the city looked as if it had just been through an extensive makeover. It was a wonder the amount of difference the lack of traffic and pollutants made.

They were nearly at the Pune expressway when Melissa finally spoke.

‘Can we stop for a bit?’ she asked.

Samir gave her an impatient look. ‘I’d like to get on the expressway before traffic builds up,’ he said. ‘Can you hold on till we get to the first toll? There’s a food plaza there, and it’s only around an hour off.’

‘I’m hungry,’ she said in a small voice.

She’d missed dinner the night before, and the hostel breakfast service only started at seven in the morning. It was all very well for Samir, she thought resentfully. He probably had a retinue of cooks who would have a piping hot breakfast on the table even if he decided to leave home at four a.m.

Unwilling to explain that she was actually feeling light-headed with hunger, she said, ‘And I need to use the loo. Right now.’ Ha—that wasn’t something he could argue with.

It didn’t look as if he was fooled, but he pulled into a burger joint.

‘D’you want anything?’ she asked, and he shook his head.

‘I’ll wait outside,’ he said.

‘I’ll be quick,’ she promised, and darted into the restaurant.

The queues were long, and after almost an hour in the car Melissa found that she was feeling distinctly dizzy—her ears were buzzing, and by the time she got to the head of the queue she knew she was in no state to order.

‘You can go ahead,’ she muttered to the woman behind her.

‘Oh, thanks,’ the woman said gratefully—she had several kids in tow, and they had been bouncing with eagerness to order their second round of burgers. Then she looked a little more closely at Melissa. ‘Are you feeling all right?’ she asked.

Melissa had just enough time to shake her head before black spots started dancing in front of her eyes.

Samir finished sending out a couple of urgent e-mails on his smart phone and looked up, thinking that as they’d stopped anyway a coffee might be a good idea.

The restaurant had plate-glass windows on three sides, and just as he was about to start towards it he saw Melissa sink gracefully into the arms of the middle-aged woman standing next to her. He took the next few steps at a run, bursting into the restaurant just as the woman helped Melissa to a sofa.

‘What’s happened to her?’ he asked, his voice harsh, and the woman looked up in undisguised relief.

‘Oh, are you with her? Thank heavens. I didn’t know what to do! I think she’s just feeling a little faint. Rishu, give me that soda! And the rest of you kids, go and sit with Vishal Uncle. I’ll be with you in a minute.’

The kid she’d addressed gave up the drink without a peep, though he looked rather upset. Melissa was trying to sit up now, and the woman held the paper cup to her lips.

‘Thanks,’ Melissa said after a few sips. ‘Sorry about this.’

‘No worries,’ the woman said comfortably, straightening up. ‘I’ll be right over there in case you need help,’ she told Samir. ‘I think she’s OK now, but a check-up might be in order once you guys get home.’

Melissa thanked her again, and gave Samir an awkward look once the woman went away.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she said. ‘This hasn’t ever happened before.’

He was frowning. ‘Do you feel OK otherwise? Should I take you back to Mumbai? That woman was right—you need to see a doctor.’

But Melissa was already shaking her head. ‘There’s no need,’ she said. ‘I think I’ll be fine once I eat something.’

His frown deepened. ‘Did you have breakfast?’ he asked abruptly, and she shook her head. ‘Dinner last night?’

Feeling hideously embarrassed, she shook her head again.

‘Why not? What time did you leave work?’

‘Nine-forty,’ she muttered. ‘The hostel curfew is at ten on week-nights, so I had to rush back. And I forgot that I was out of instant noodles.’

‘We’ll talk after I get some food into you,’ Samir said grimly. The interested onlookers in the restaurant waved him to the head of the queue and he came back with a chicken burger and a milkshake.

Melissa took the burger, but shook her head at the milkshake. ‘Lactose intolerant,’ she explained before biting into the juicy bun. The rush of flavours had her feeling a little sick for a few seconds, but the nausea soon receded and she tore enthusiastically into the burger.

‘I’ll get you another one,’ Samir muttered, rejoining the queue. It took him a little longer this time, but he came back with another burger, a soft drink and a coffee for himself.

‘So did you have lunch yesterday?’ he asked conversationally.

Melissa paused mid-bite. ‘I did,’ she said cautiously. ‘At least I think I did. Yes, of course! I remember. Dubeyji ordered a plate of pav-bhaji, and I shared it with him.’

‘You do know that you’re allowed time off for meals, don’t you?’ he asked. ‘And that the agency won’t shut down if you leave early enough to have dinner?’

She laughed. ‘Yes, of course,’ she said. ‘This must be the first time I’ve missed dinner because of work. It’s just that I hadn’t originally planned on going to Goa, and I had a bunch of stuff to finish before I could go.’

‘So essentially it’s my fault?’ Samir said.

Melissa said, ‘Oh, no!’ before she realised he was teasing her. Blushing hotly, she buried her face in her paper cup of soda.

‘That’s better,’ he said. ‘Finally, you have some colour in your cheeks.’

‘I can’t have colour in my cheeks. I’m too brown,’ she retorted.

‘Rubbish,’ he said, and lightly patted her arm, sending a little tingle through her, all the way down to her toes. ‘Tell me when you’re feeling better and we’ll leave. No hurry.’

‘I’m good to go,’ she announced, bouncing to her feet.

Samir put a steadying arm around her. ‘Careful, don’t jump around,’ he said. ‘We can’t have you collapsing again.’

‘I won’t,’ she protested, intensely conscious of the strong arm around her waist.

He didn’t let her go till he’d handed her into the passenger seat of the car. Even then he waited till she was properly belted in before he went around to the driver’s seat and got in.

‘I need you to let me know if you’re feeling the slightest bit unwell,’ he said. ‘And I’m relaxing the no food in the car rule—you can have what you want as long as you don’t collapse again.’

In spite of her cynicism about rich playboys Melissa felt rather touched by Samir’s awkwardly expressed concern. It had been a while since someone had cared enough about her to fuss. Even if the fussing was being done in an off-hand, ultra-macho kind of way.

Samir connected his MP3 player to the car’s music system before they drove off. Melissa had assumed he’d be into rock or heavy metal, but surprisingly most of the tracks were ghazals or Bollywood oldies.

She hummed along to some of her favourite songs—she had a sweet and unexpectedly strong voice, and Samir found himself listening more to her than to the original song playing through the car speakers. She seemed so completely unselfconscious that he felt himself relaxing a little. It was a surprisingly liberating change, being with someone who didn’t have an agenda either to impress him or to get information out of him.

‘Who do you keep texting?’ he asked as he watched her type out her third or fourth message since she’d stepped into the car. ‘You’re like a stenographer on steroids, the way you keep hammering into that phone.’

The second the words were out of his mouth he realised that he’d let himself relax a bit too much. Making personal remarks to someone he hardly knew was completely uncharacteristic of him—no wonder she was staring at him as if he’d grown a third eye in the middle of his forehead like Lord Shiva.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said immediately. ‘None of my business—forget I asked.’

Melissa laughed, showing a perfect set of teeth, small, white and very even.

‘I’m texting a friend back at the hostel,’ she said. ‘We just passed the turn-off for that new amusement park that’s been built here. One of the girls is coming next weekend with her latest boyfriend—she wanted to know how long it would take to get here.’

‘Won’t it be more suitable for kids?’

‘No, there are rides for adults as well. And the tickets are quite expensive—it’s a rather cool place for a first date. For regular people, I mean.’

He raised his eyebrows. ‘As opposed to irregular people like me?’

Refusing to be embarrassed, Melissa said, ‘You know what I mean. If you took a girl out for a date you’d probably go to the theatre, or to a restaurant in a five-star hotel. The guys my friends date don’t even own cars—they don’t have many places to take a girl to.’

‘Where does your boyfriend take you?’ Samir asked, half jokingly and half because he wanted to know for sure that she was unattached. This asking questions thing was pretty addictive—especially when the other person was as cool about it as Melissa.

‘I don’t have a boyfriend,’ she said, but there was something rather weird in the way she said it, as if she was mocking herself.

Samir wouldn’t normally have given himself credit for being perceptive, but instinctively he knew he needed to change the topic.

‘Do you like your job?’ he asked, and she gave him a startled look.

‘Yes,’ she said cautiously, and then, ‘Why? Is there any chance I mightn’t have it any longer?’

This time Samir looked startled. ‘Not that I know of. I’m not making any changes in the agency structure—not for now at least. And when I do it definitely won’t be at your level.’

‘Too junior?’ she asked, giving him a cheeky wink. ‘Or is my salary not big enough to dent the profit figures?’

It probably wasn’t, but Samir could hardly say so without sounding impossibly condescending. He hesitated for a second, and she let him off the hook by jumping to another subject.

‘I just found a pack of candy in my purse,’ she announced. ‘I’d forgotten I had them. You want one?’

Samir shook his head.

‘They’re nice,’ she persisted. ‘Tamarind and sugar.’

He took his eyes off the road for a second and glanced at the small packet in her hand. ‘I haven’t seen that stuff in years,’ he said. ‘They used to hand them out on flights when I was in college—I used to stuff my pockets full of them.’

‘Does that mean you want one, then?’

‘Yes, please. But you’ll have to unwrap it first. I can’t take my hands off the wheel.’

She took a sweet out of its wrapper and waited for him to take it from her. They were near Lonavla now, and at a rather tricky section of the road. There was no way Samir could let go of the wheel, and the candy had begun to melt in Melissa’s palm.

‘This is going all sticky,’ she warned, and then, feeling very daring, ‘Should I pop it in your mouth?’

He nodded, and she immediately wished she hadn’t been quite so forward. He parted his perfectly sculpted lips a little and she leaned across to pop the sweet into his mouth. The candy stuck to her fingers for a few seconds and finally he sucked it off, the feel of his lips and tongue incredibly erotic against her skin.

Pulse racing, Melissa sat back and shot him a covert look. He was as unruffled as ever, but there was a slight smile playing about his lips. Until that instant she hadn’t thought of him as someone she could actually get involved with. There were so many reasons, but right now she couldn’t think clearly about them. All she could think about was how easy it would be to lean a little closer to him, breathe in the heady scent of his cologne, drop a kiss on his lips when he next turned to speak to her...

And probably make him drive the car into a road divider and kill them both. She sighed. Having a pragmatic side was all very well, but it did have a bad habit of popping up and ruining her best fantasies. So, all right, perhaps trying to seduce him while he was driving wasn’t a good plan.

She stole another look at Samir. He had the kind of good looks that grew on you. The first time she’d seen him she’d thought he looked gorgeous, but rather cold—not her type at all. But the more time she spent with him, the more she noticed things—like the way his smile reached all the way up to his eyes when he was amused, and how he pushed his unruly hair off his forehead in an unconsciously sexy gesture every few minutes.

* * *

At around the end of the expressway Samir pulled out an electronic tablet and handed it to Melissa. ‘I’ve plotted the route on this—the car’s GPS isn’t terribly reliable in this part of the world. Will you keep an eye on it to make sure we’re on track?’

Melissa looked at him in horror. ‘Don’t you know where you’re going?’ she asked.

He laughed. ‘Goa,’ he said. ‘We’ll get there eventually. Sooner rather than later if you’re a good navigator.’

She proved to be an excellent navigator—though more than once Samir found himself getting distracted by the way her hair fell across her face as she pored over the map, and the way her brow wrinkled up with concentration.

Even the first time he’d met her he’d thought that she had lovely eyes, but it was only now that he noticed the flawlessness of her dusky complexion and the near perfect shape of her lips. Her slim figure curved enticingly at all the right places, and in the few seconds he’d held her after she fainted he hadn’t been able to help thinking how soft her skin was, and how right she felt in his arms.

* * *

‘We’ll be in Kolhapur in another hour or so,’ Melissa said, effectively breaking into his thoughts. ‘Are we stopping there or going straight on?’

‘We could stop for lunch,’ Samir said. ‘There’s another burger place on the highway, and a couple of coffee shops as well.’

Melissa wrinkled up her nose. ‘I had two burgers for breakfast,’ she said. ‘I don’t think I can look one in the face for a while. Can we go somewhere else? I’ve often seen Vegetable Kolhapur on restaurant menus—would it be a kind of speciality here?’

‘Along with Kolhapuri chappals,’ Samir agreed solemnly.

Melissa made a face at him. ‘I wasn’t planning to buy footwear. But do let’s stop somewhere in the city.’

It would add another hour to the drive at least, but Samir complied. After Melissa’s fainting fit his attitude towards her had changed. Not normally indulgent towards other people’s whims, he found himself unaccountably wanting to fall in with whatever she wanted.

They chose a small restaurant in the centre of the city—the food was spicy, and not really to his taste, but it was worth the delay just to see Melissa savour the meal. Unlike the perpetually dieting women Samir normally dated, she genuinely enjoyed her food, just about stopping short of licking her fingers after polishing off everything on her plate.

‘Dessert?’ he asked after she was done. ‘There’s ice creams and gulab jamun. Or, no, you can’t have the ice cream if you’re lactose-intolerant. Gulab jamun?’

It was the first time anyone had actually remembered she was lactose intolerant—people who’d known her for years, including her own sister-in-law, continued to ply her with milkshakes and ice cream every time they met. Maybe he just had a good memory, but she couldn’t help feeling a little flattered.

‘Gulab jamun,’ she said.

Samir watched her as she dug a spoon into a gulab jamun, golden syrup gushing out of the round sweet. It was a messy dish to eat, and she paused a couple of times to lick the syrup off her lips. His eyes were automatically drawn to her lush mouth and the way her little pink tongue ran over its contours. She was the first woman he’d met whose simplest gesture ended up being unconsciously sexy. Or, then again, maybe he was just turning into a horny old man.

‘How old are you?’ he asked abruptly.

‘Twenty-four,’ Melissa said, and her brow furrowed up as she polished off the last bit of gulab jamun. ‘Why?’

Why, indeed? She looked so young that for a second he’d wondered if she was underage.

‘I was thinking about the ad you wrote,’ he said. ‘I’d assumed it was written by an older woman—someone with kids.’

‘Oh, that,’ she said, looking embarrassed. ‘I spent a lot of time with my sister-in-law after my nephew was born. She didn’t have anyone else to help her with the baby.’

‘Still, it was a very insightful piece of work. I’ll be surprised if it doesn’t win something.’

Feeling more and more embarrassed, Melissa said, ‘Has Brian been brainwashing you?’

Samir laughed, his eyes crinkling up at the corners in a particularly attractive way. ‘He happened to mention it a few times. But I don’t get easily influenced by other people’s opinions. Are you done? We should leave if we want to get to Goa before it’s dark.’

He put a hand under her elbow to guide her out of the restaurant and Melissa felt all her fantasies come rushing back in full force. Of course he was probably just being polite. Or he was worried she’d keel over and faint once again, and he’d have to carry her out on his shoulder. Either way, her insides were doing weird things at his touch, and the temptation to touch him in return was immense.

She tried to kill the fantasy by imagining his reaction. Shock? Embarrassment? Then she remembered the feel of his lips on her fingers as he’d taken the sticky candy from them, and she couldn’t help thinking that maybe, just maybe, he’d reciprocate. Bend down and kiss her. Tangle his big strong hands in her hair and tip her head back to get better access to her lips...

‘Melissa?’

Brought back to earth with a thump, she realised he was holding the car door open for her.

‘Sorry,’ she said, sliding into her seat quickly.

‘You’re a complete daydreamer, aren’t you?’ he asked, looking rather amused as he got into the driver’s seat. ‘What were you thinking about?’

Ha—wouldn’t you like to know? Melissa felt like saying. Maybe some day she’d actually be confident enough to come back with the truth when a man like Samir asked her a question like that. Unfortunately, as of now, she was less than halfway there.

‘Just stuff,’ she said after a pause.

‘Random stuff?’

‘Oh, very random.’ He’d sounded a bit sceptical, and she felt she needed to justify herself. ‘As random as Brownian motion—you know, that thing they show you in school...dust motes being tossed around by invisible molecules...my mind’s a bit like that.’

He gave her a long look, and she shook her head, laughing.

‘Sorry, sorry. Rambling a bit there.’

‘Just a bit,’ he said, but his lips quirked up at the corners as if he was trying hard not to smile.

Melissa had a nasty feeling that he knew exactly what she’d been thinking about. She concentrated on her phone for a bit, replying to the various texts that had come in while they were at lunch. When she looked up they were on the highway again, going down a rather lovely stretch of road with sugarcane fields on both sides and rolling green hills on the horizon.

‘Look at the bougainvillaea down the centre of the road—aren’t they beautiful?’

Samir hadn’t noticed the bougainvillaea other than as an unnecessary distraction—at her words, though, he gave them a quick glance.

‘They’re OK, I guess,’ he said. ‘Though they seem to be planted in any old order. White for a few hundred metres and then miles of pink, with a couple of yellows thrown in.’

‘I thought that was the nicest thing about them,’ she returned. ‘They look as if they’ve just sprung up, not as if someone planned—’ She stopped short as she took in Samir’s less than interested expression. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘The driving must be stressful, and here I am babbling about bougainvillaea.’

‘And now you’re making me feel guilty about being a grumpy old git,’ Samir said wryly. ‘I’m sorry—I’m not very good at noticing things.’

‘I’m the opposite,’ Melissa said, mock-mournfully. ‘I notice everything. My head’s chock-full of all kinds of unnecessary junk.’

‘It’ll all come in handy some day,’ Samir said. ‘You’ll be brilliant if you’re on a quiz show, one day, and they show you a picture of a road and ask you to identify it.’

The good stretch seemed to be over now, because the next turnoff they took was onto a road that barely deserved the name. It was pretty much a long stretch of potholes connected by little strips of tar, and Melissa winced as the car bounced up and down.

‘Sorry,’ Samir said, putting a brief steadying hand on her knee as they went over a particularly bad crater.

Even through the frayed denim of her cut-offs Melissa could feel the warm strength of his hand, and she began to feel a lot more positive about the state of the road. Every cloud...et cetera, et cetera, she thought, an involuntary grin coming to her lips.

Beginning to enjoy herself thoroughly now, she let the next crater bounce her sideways so that she landed on his shoulder. ‘Oops,’ she said. ‘You need to drive more carefully, Samir.’

Samir gave her a sideways look but didn’t say anything. That last bounce had been deliberate, he was sure of it, but she seemed to be doing it for fun. He was used to women saying and doing things to win his approval—Melissa was something else altogether. She was definitely as attracted to him as he was to her, but she was treating the whole situation as a bit of a joke.

‘I’m rolling the windows down,’ she announced when they came to a stretch where, wonder of wonders, there was an actual repair crew busily laying a new layer of tar on top of the existing apology for a road. ‘I love the smell of fresh tar.’

She didn’t wait for his permission, and Samir wondered what she’d have said if he told her he was allergic to dust and tarry smells. He wasn’t, but if he had been she’d probably have found that funny as well, he thought resignedly.

‘Did you notice how the colour of the soil changes between states?’ she was asking. ‘It was brown while we were in Maharashtra, then it turned black near the Karnataka border—and in Goa it’s brick-red.’

Samir shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t notice something like that even if there were mile-high signs telling me about it.’

Melissa didn’t say anything, but it was clear she thought that not noticing anything sounded incredibly boring.

He gave her a quick smile. ‘Though I do notice that you have a dirt smear on your cheek,’ he said, stroking the offending item lightly with the back of his hand. ‘That comes from having your nose stuck out of the window.’

‘Touché,’ Melissa said and grinned as she rubbed the smudge off. ‘I’ve always wanted to say that to someone, only I’ve never met anyone swanky enough to speak French to.’

‘I might be swanky, but I can at least speak Hindi,’ Samir remarked. ‘You’re jabbering away in English all the time.’

‘In the agency? That’s because poor old Dubeyji almost had a heart attack when I tried speaking to him in Hindi. Apparently my grammar’s all wrong, and I sound terribly rude.’

‘You sound terribly rude even when you’re speaking English,’ Samir murmured.

She punched him lightly in the arm. ‘Ouch, way too musclebound,’ she said, pretending to nurse the knuckles on her right hand. ‘You should go easy on the gym—live life a little. You’d make a much nicer punching bag if you were flabby.’

‘What a nice thought,’ he said, laughing. ‘But I think I’ll stick to my gym routine. And you might want to concentrate on that map—there’s a town coming up and I’ve no idea whether to go through it or around it.’

* * *

‘You have reached your destination,’ the smug voice-over on the map informed them a few hours later.

‘Except that we’re in the middle of freaking nowhere,’ Samir muttered.

After telling them to take a right turn towards the Uttorda beach the map had carefully led them to a cul-de-sac, with the beach on one side and a grove of coconut trees on the other.

A man passed by them, whistling cheerfully, and Melissa rolled down the window. ‘Is there a hotel nearby?’ she asked him in Konkani.

‘Lots,’ the man said. ‘This is Goa—not the Thar desert. Any particular one that you might be looking for?’

Melissa consulted the name on the map and told him.

‘You’ll need to go back the way you came for a kilometre or so,’ he said. ‘Turn right at the big purple house and you’ll see the signs for the hotel.’

‘Well, at least it got us this far,’ Samir said in resigned tones as he switched off the tablet a few minutes later. ‘Though I wish our friend back there had given clearer directions—every third house here is purple. It didn’t occur to me earlier—you’re Goan, aren’t you? Don’t you have family here?’

‘They all live very far away,’ Melissa said. ‘Um, should I call Devdeep or someone who’s already arrived and get proper directions?’

‘You’d need to explain where we are first,’ Samir said. ‘Let’s do the old-fashioned thing and ask a real live human being.’

The next ‘real live human being’ they met fortunately knew the area well, and within ten minutes they were pulling into the hotel grounds.

‘Thanks once again,’ Melissa said once they’d arrived. She was feeling unaccountably shy, and automatically reverted to formality. ‘You didn’t have to give me a lift, but you did, and I had a great time.’

For a few seconds Samir looked down at her, his dark eyes mesmerising in their intensity. Then a hostess bustled up to them with a tray of welcome drinks and the moment passed.

‘I’ll see you around, then,’ Samir said, taking his room keys from the bellboy and slinging his bag over his shoulder. ‘Some of the other guys are already here—you could call them and catch up maybe.’

Was that a subtle way of telling her not to expect to hang around with him? Melissa felt absurdly upset at the thought as she watched him stride away.

Just as he was about to step out of the lobby, he turned around. ‘Melissa?’

‘Yes?’ she said.

‘Make sure you eat your meals on time, OK?’ he said, smiling a crooked little smile. ‘No fainting when you’re called up to receive the award.’

‘OK,’ she said.

It was only when she reached her room and looked into the mirror that she realised that she was still smiling goofily.

‘Idiot woman,’ she told her reflection crossly. ‘It was fun, but the trip’s over now. You’ll be lucky if he pays any attention to you at all after this.’

Her reflection looked back at her just as crossly, and she gave it a wry grin.

‘I know. I liked him too. But he’s my boss—I can’t chase after him. Time for a cold shower now, OK?’

She moved away from the mirror, her good humour at least partly restored. She’d decided a couple of years back not to take men too seriously, and so far she’d managed to stick by it.

Wandering into the bathroom, she hummed softly under her breath as she turned on the taps. Eek, the cold water was really, really cold. Maybe a lukewarm shower would do just as well without giving her pneumonia.

By the time she was done with ironing an impossibly crushed pair of shorts, tucking her hair under a shower cap and actually going ahead and taking a shower, it was past six. It took her a few seconds to give her hair a brushing and pull on a yellow spaghetti strap top over the neatly ironed shorts. Once she was done, she gave herself a quick look in the mirror and headed off to the beach.

There was an enthusiastic game of cricket in progress between Devdeep and a couple of other guys from Mendonca’s and a bunch of youngsters from another agency. Pretty much the entire Mumbai advertising fraternity seemed to be in Goa, either infesting the beach or helping the state economy along by drinking larger quantities of beer and feni.

‘Join us!’ one of the younger cricket players in the group yelled out to Melissa.

‘You’re supposed to play volleyball on the beach, not cricket,’ she yelled back. ‘Losers!’

‘Leave her alone—girls can’t play cricket,’ one of the surlier members of the team grunted.

‘Oh, can’t they?’ Melissa said, promptly kicking off her sandals and joining them.

The sand felt good under her feet—it had been a long while since she’d gone barefoot. Mumbai had its fair share of beaches, but they were crowded and often dirty.

‘You can field,’ the surly man said. ‘Just don’t get in the way of the other fielders.’

Melissa didn’t say anything—just waited till the luckless batsman hit a ball in her direction. She moved across the sand like a guided missile, leaving Mr Surly and the others gaping as she caught the ball in mid-air and whirled around to knock down a wicket. Clearly unused to running in the sand, the batsmen were only halfway down the crease—they didn’t stand a chance.

‘Out,’ she said with satisfaction. ‘I think I’ll bowl next, thank you.’

There was a second of stunned silence, and then ‘her’ team started cheering madly. The bowler was the man who’d first called out to her, and he relinquished his place to her gladly. He was a nice-looking chap, with curly hair and an impish grin, and Melissa liked him immediately.

‘Down here for the ad fest?’ he asked as he handed over the ball.

Melissa nodded.

‘I’m Akash,’ he said. ‘Would you like to catch up later? Figure out which of our entries is likely to get a gold in the festival?’

‘Akash, stop hitting on the bowler,’ one of the other players said.

‘Yeah, Akash, there’s no way she’d want to be seen with a loser like you,’ another chimed in.

Melissa gave the guy a saucy grin. ‘I’ll tell you once the game is over,’ she said.

She wasn’t in the least attracted to him, but it made sense hanging out with a bunch of people her own age rather than hanging around and hoping Samir would come and find her.


THREE

After thirteen hours behind the wheel, every muscle in Samir’s body felt stiff—he was supposed to be at a ‘networking’ session, but it sounded so incredibly boring that he’d made a flimsy excuse and escaped to his room.

Once there, he changed into running shorts and a dry fit T-shirt before slipping on his running shoes. A run would make up for the gym session he’d missed in the morning. Hopefully it would also get him tired enough to stop thinking about Melissa’s lissom body.

Used to running on Tarmac, or on the jogging track at the Mumbai race course, Samir avoided the beach. The lane outside the hotel had a fair bit of traffic, and he turned off into a by-lane as soon as he could. There was much less traffic here, other than the occasional cow or motorcycle, and he was able to build up a decent pace.

Running always helped clear his head, and he was able to think a little more rationally about his reaction to Melissa. She was an attractive woman, but he’d been seeing her around the office for weeks now and had never turned to give her a second look. Maybe it had been the effect of being thrown together with her for several hours—yes, that had to be it, he decided. And her fainting fit in the morning had aroused his protective instincts.

The sun was on the verge of setting when Samir glanced at his watch. He had been running for forty-five minutes—a little short of his normal hour, but perfectly respectable. He was opposite one of the public entrances to the Uttorda beach, and he slowed to a walk.

He felt strangely reluctant to go back to the hotel. It had been only a couple of years since he’d started actually running the companies his family owned, and he wasn’t yet used to the automatically deferential way the teams treated him. It was especially noticeable in Mendonca Advertising, because as a rule advertising people were a lot less respectful of hierarchy—Brian had been treated more like a well-loved uncle than a boss.

Maybe the rumours that he was planning to downsize accounted for it. People like Devdeep were desperately trying to prove that they were creative and revenue-focussed at the same time, like a modern-day David Ogilvy and Jack Welch rolled into one. And others, like Dubeyji, the elderly man who managed their Hindi advertising, were openly resentful. If you wanted to run a company successfully you couldn’t keep everyone happy—Brian had tried, and in the process almost run the agency into the ground.

Green coconut water would be good, if he could find someone selling it, he thought as he made his way to the beach. There was a small stall right at the entry to the beach, and he paid for a coconut, sipping the delicate water through a straw as he walked towards the sea. There was a game of cricket in progress—and while the teams seemed to have very little regard for the rules of the game, they were evidently having the time of their lives.

Something vaguely familiar about one of the women playing caught his eye, and he automatically slowed down. She was slim, brown-skinned, with endless legs and flyaway hair, and he felt a jolt of recognition hit him as she turned to laugh at something one of the other players was saying.

In the next second Melissa caught sight of Samir, and she tossed the bat to the next player and came towards him.

‘I just got run out,’ she said, making a face. ‘I’m brilliant at bowling and fielding—batting’s not so good. though. Where were you? Jogging?’

‘Running,’ he said.

She probably didn’t care if he’d been running or sprinting or playing hopscotch, but it seemed important to make the distinction. Jogging sounded like the kind of thing you did when you were forty and over the hill. Of course, to someone Melissa’s age thirty might seem just as ancient.

She was looking at his shoes now, inspecting them as carefully as if she meant to buy them from him. ‘You have proper running shoes,’ she stated, sounding surprised. ‘Everyone I know uses everything interchangeably—tennis shoes and football studs and running shoes.’

‘Or they just run around barefoot,’ Samir said, before he could help it.

Even covered in sand, her feet were very pretty, the nails painted a bright turquoise and a little silver anklet around one ankle. He’d been trying to keep his eyes off her legs and her small, pert breasts jiggling around under her yellow top, but her bare feet were pretty sexy as well.

Melissa made a face. Her spontaneous reaction when she’d seen Samir had been to come across to him—she’d forgotten what a sight she must look, with her muddy denim shorts, windswept hair and bare feet.

‘I didn’t bring proper shoes,’ she said. ‘And it was a spur-of-the-moment thing, joining these guys—I was planning to go and splash around in the sea, so I wore beach slippers.’




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